


Origins

by Anonymous



Category: Descendants (Disney Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe, I changed the ages a little, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Manipulation, Not Canon Compliant, Not Canon To The Books
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-16
Updated: 2019-11-16
Packaged: 2021-01-31 18:01:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,386
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21450412
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: Beware of the strange girl who offers you everything you ever wanted
Comments: 2
Kudos: 34
Collections: anonymous





	Origins

This boy was proving to be much more than met the eye.

His name was Carlos De Vil. He was 12 years old. He had lived with his mother for years. He was abused, that was clear. The way he moved, talked, and acted clearly shown signs of abuse. He spoke about his mother as if she could hear him. He feared her.

The boy was gifted with being small and looking innocent. He was able to sneak into places and steal whatever he needed to survive. Most would never suspect him, but Mal knew better. He would be very useful in battle.

He was afraid. Everything about him screamed it. Carlos De Vil was made of defense mechanisms upon defense mechanisms. His first impulse was always to run. To blend into the shadows, create a distraction, make himself invisible. That was sensible of him. He was at the bottom of the world, and he knew it. 

He was too thin—not emaciated, not starving, but a string of bad breaks away from it. There was a hunger in his eyes, and not merely for food. Envy at the uncaring world around his, yes, bitterness, yes. But something softer, too. More desperate. This boy wanted something more than mere survival. The thing he most desired, Mal soon realized, was something intangible that he’d gone his whole life without. Recognition. Care. Affection.

Carlos wanted to be loved. 

He hid it under layers of acquired bitterness, cynicism. He did not want to trust Mal. He accepted gifts warily, assumed he would somehow have to pay for them. Food got him to talk, but only after he’d eaten it—the boy wolfed down the meals like he was afraid Mal would snatch them away from him. But as Mal soothed his fears, told him how clever he was, how talented, she could see something begin to shift in his mannerisms. 

He was still afraid, still wary when he looked at Mal...but there was a spark of hope there too. That maybe, just maybe, he was a boy in a fairy-tale, a plucky hero saved by a 14 year old girl who walked into his life and gave him everything he’d ever dreamed of. That maybe he wouldn’t die at the hands of his mother after all. He was afraid to believe that could ever truly happen to him...but deep down he knew it could.

If Mal could make Carlos love her, he’d be hers forever.

(X)

This was not what Mal had expected to find.

She needed an extra edge to be absolutely sure of victory when taking on Enchantress for control of the Isle. Hiring somebody like Jafar for the job seemed perfectly logical. This had been meant to be a simple trip to Jafar's place, in order to barter for a simple service.

A burning cabin, a dead body, and a 15 year old boy beaten bloody was not simple.

But Mal was nothing if not adaptive. She chose her words carefully, and before long it became clear what she had stumbled across. A boy raised to be a weapon, who had lived his entire life in that cabin with his father, brutally trained to follow in his footsteps. A boy who, it was clear, had finally surpassed his teacher.

Jay was not what she had expected to find. Not at all. He was better.

What’s in it for me, he had asked, giving her a wary look, and Mal had told him in no uncertain terms. He could brave the wilds on badly-injured body with nothing but the clothes on his back, or he could come with her. She offered him safety. A chance to put his skills to the test. A place to be. A purpose.

He was a lot like Carlos, in a way.

But only up to a point. Jay didn’t want love from her. Jay had no illusions as to the nature of their relationship; he saw her as someone who wanted to use him. For most people this would be a deal-breaker, but Jay didn’t care . He was made to be used, after all; his father had drilled that into his head. He could see no reason not to align himself with the first person to come along and offer him a job. Carlos dreamed of a better life, but Jay knew that this life was all he’d ever have.

Mal could work with that. She didn’t need his devotion. Just his obedience.

The first stages of a plan were starting to come together in Mal’s mind. Jay adjusted well to his new life in time, after he had been treated by Mal and his body started to feel better. Jay was a practical boy. Logical. He would never bite the hand that fed him, so long as that hand wasn't curled in a fist.

Carlos, meanwhile, seemed to finally be understanding his place. Mal had told him in no uncertain terms when he’d protested against bringing Jay on full-time: this was not a partnership. Mal would not refuse a gift like this in order to spare Carlos’s petty jealousy. 

Jealousy, as if the stupid boy thought he was owed Mal’s undivided attention. What right had he to be jealous? He should be happy with what Mal gave him, because without Mal he would be nothing. Carlos had taken the chastisement to heart. He didn’t know how to live without Mal now—the fear of abandonment, it turned out, was enough to keep him in line. He was a creature of emotion; he responded to Mal’s emotions to an almost obsessive degree.

(X)

Mal had learned much from her mother, but Maleficent's most important lesson was this: if you wish to conquer a land, a city, an organization, then you find the existing fault lines and put pressure on them until they break. There was a Beauty & Robbery group camped in the outskirts of the Isle, led by the Evil Queen's daughter.

She sent Carlos in first, to use his smallness to infiltrate, listen, and learn unseen. The report he came back was rife with interesting details—Evie was planning to overthrow her mother as the leader of Beauty & Robbery. Many of Evil Queen's own followers were in on it and were ready to serve Evie. Evie considered herself better than her mother in every way, and Mal had a fairly good idea of what she had to work with.

Evie was worshiped by most of her followers. Boys and girls alike. An angry, hurt bunch, with nothing to lose and everything to gain, easily led by someone who had the words. Evie had plenty of words, some of beauty, some of clothes, even some of fashion magazines. 

But all her words included one thing: manipulation. Evie was able to manipulate her followers by using their low self-confidence and promising to help them. Mal knew that type well. 

She was like her, only smaller.

Her first attempt to recruit her didn’t succeed. It was her own fault, really. She had appealed to logic in explaining exactly what she could gain from an alliance, emotion in playing to her ego, telling her how valuable and beautiful she was, promising to make her every desire come true. But she refused to listen. 

Evie didn't want to be controlled by someone ever again. She wanted to be the one in control.

Mal knew her type very well indeed; she knew the 14 year old would not bow down to her until she proved her strength. She needed to get her attention. She needed to make her fear her.

The attack on Enchantress didn’t go entirely to plan(she escaped into the water before she could be killed), but it left Mal with all the power to make her point. She intimidated Evie with the fact that she was now Queen of The Isle. She would now listen to her.

She could make every fantasy of hers come true no matter how outlandish, free her from any and all consequences, leave the world burning at her—at her—feet. All she had to do was follow—no, ally herself with her cause.

Or she could kill her. It wasn’t hard for her to make the right choice.

Everyone chose well, in the end.


End file.
